Housing in Tourist Destinations

Debate between Justin Madders and Charles Walker

Tuesday 28th November 2023 Westminster Hall

[Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Sir Charles. I start by congratulating the hon. Member for St Austell and Newquay (Steve Double) on securing the debate. I also welcome the Housing Minister to his role. Reference has been made to the rapidity of changes in the identity of the Housing Minister. One wonders whether, with such a rapid turnover in the occupants of the Housing Department, it should be sponsored by Airbnb.

The hon. Member for St Austell and Newquay set out very well the challenges facing his constituency: the pressure on the housing market, the issues with recruitment, and the stark disparity between the average house price and the average wage in Cornwall. He was right to welcome the increase in local housing allowance and to mention the pressure placed on parish councils—all local authorities will recognise that.

My hon. Friend the Member for City of Chester (Samantha Dixon) showed what an excellent Member of Parliament she is and what an excellent council leader she was in bringing back council housing. She now has a third role as an excellent advocate for the Chester tourist board, because she spoke glowingly about the wonderful attractions in Chester. However, she really identified the nub of the issue, which is how right to buy has turned into private rented sector lets, which have turned into short-term lets. That is really at the root of the problems we are discussing. As an MP with a neighbouring constituency, I can see that the pressures Chester is experiencing are having an impact on the wider housing market.

The hon. Member for East Devon (Simon Jupp) spoke about the balance that needs to be struck between the competing demands in his area. That is absolutely the right way to look at this issue.

It was a pleasure to hear from my hon. Friend the Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell). She spoke in stark terms about the pressures in York, with a 23% increase in house prices and the fourth highest rents in the country. However, she also talked about a £6 billion tax deficit—money that is not reaching the Exchequer—and I am sure my colleagues in the shadow Treasury team will be looking at that with interest. She also made the important point that this is a cross-departmental issue and that a taskforce approach should be considered. I will certainly take that point back to others in the team.

Cross-departmental approaches were also raised by the hon. Member for North Devon (Selaine Saxby), so it is absolutely clear that there is more than one tool in the arsenal that we can use. She also mentioned the pressures this issue puts on education and dentistry, and I think we all recognise the pressures that those parts of the public sector face.

The hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) talked about average house prices in his constituency being 12 times average incomes. I think we can all see why it is absolutely impossible for young people, in particular, to get on the housing ladder when they face these issues. The hon. Member was also right to raise the impact these issues have on recruitment in the hospitality and care sectors.

The hon. Members for Truro and Falmouth (Cherilyn Mackrory), for Strangford (Jim Shannon) and for St Ives (Derek Thomas) also all spoke with great passion and sincerity about the issues this subject brings up. To summarise the crux of those issues, it is clear that the housing problems in tourist hotspots have spiralled over the last decade and that the Government have not got a handle on the situation. As a result, local people are facing deep problems in accessing affordable housing.

Those who live year round in some of the most beautiful parts of the country are being squeezed out by the owners of second homes and the proliferation of short-term lets. People who have grown up in an area, who work there and who are the bedrock of the community now feel secondary to those who spend just a portion of their time there. I think we can all see how that direction of travel has hollowed out communities, and the consequences that can flow from that.

Having said that, as other Members have said, there is clearly a balance to be struck—one I think we all appreciate. Tourism is crucial to local economies, and indeed to regional and national economies, and many local communities rely on an influx of visitors to keep their economies going. In some places, tourism is the No.1 income generator, and we cannot ignore that. The availability of accommodation is also an important element in attracting people to visit a particular destination.

However, I reiterate that a balance has to be struck. For these destinations to thrive, there needs to be a community that underpins the hospitality at attractions; otherwise, who will be there to run the services that both visitors and locals rely on? Unfortunately, I think that that balance has got out of kilter in recent years, and the consequences that flow from that have been set out today.

Demand for housing has spiralled in many tourist destinations across the country. It was reported that, in the south-west alone, 3,000 new holiday and second homes were listed during the pandemic, while the number of homes listed for normal letting halved and rents increased significantly. In Wales during that period, there was a 5% increase in the number of holiday lets, with average rents rising from £155 to £181 a week. As a consequence, house prices in those areas have spiked.

The ONS reported in September 2021 that house prices were rising at three times the national rate in some of these areas—places such as Conwy, north Devon and Richmondshire have experienced increases of more than 20%, continuing trends that had begun in the pandemic. A report published today by the CPRE shows that demand for short-term lettings grew by 661% in Cornwall in the five years to September 2021, and by 1,231% in South Lakeland between 2016 and 2020. Nationally, the number of short-term lets has increased by more than 1,000% since 2015. This is not just one part of the country; it is north, south, east and west—every place that has significant tourism activity is seeing the same. For many people in many parts of the country, the cost of purchasing a home is already out of reach; in these tourist areas, that dream is even more unobtainable for too many people.

This issue stretches far beyond the challenge of actual home ownership. In Cornwall, for example, 15,000 families are on waiting lists for social housing, which, coincidentally, is the number of properties being marketed as holiday lets. In South Lakeland, roughly half the families in need of social housing could be accommodated in the properties that are made exclusively available for holiday lets. In Cumbria more widely, the 4% decline in privately rented properties has coincided with a 14% increase in social housing waiting lists since 2016. In Devon, it is clear that short-term lets are making problems worse, with 4,000 homes taken out of the private rented sector, but 11,000 added to the short-term lets sector since 2016. Those damning statistics lay bare the impact of what happens when the balance is out of kilter. Does the Minister accept that there is a clear link between the number of private rented properties and short-term lets?

It is beyond doubt that the deregulated nature of the short-term letting sector is deeply problematic. There needs to be an overhaul of the regulatory framework. We would also argue that there is now a watertight case for giving local authorities that are struggling to cope with this issue the necessary powers to protect the sustainability and cohesion of their communities.

Reforms have been attempted on a small scale, but nothing substantial has been done to get to grips with the problem. For example, Members have talked about the consultation conducted and completed in June, and I am sure all Members will want to hear from the Minister about when it will be published. But this piecemeal, foot-dragging approach is patently not enough to tackle the deep problems faced in our communities. The Government are still opposed to, for example, the introduction of a discretionary licensing scheme of the kind the Opposition have proposed on numerous occasions. We believe that such a scheme would be part of the solution to tackling this issue.

We welcome the consultation on the new planning use class, just as we welcome the commitment to introduce a new discretionary registration scheme. However, there is a sting in the tail—giving with one hand but taking away with the other—because the new consultation also invites views on introducing new permitted development rights that would in fact make it easier to convert dwelling houses into short-term lets. Perhaps the Minister can explain the rationale for including that in the consultation and how it will help with the problems we have been discussing. I encourage hon. Members to see what investors are saying about that part of the consultation. They are happy with the consultation overall because it is light-touch and it will make it incredibly attractive and easy for them to continue to convert properties into short-term lets.

The time has gone to recognise that this is an issue; the time has gone for sticking-plaster solutions. Communities urgently require a response that is up to the scale of the problem they face. We urge the Government to accelerate the introduction of the discretionary registration scheme and to legislate for the introduction of a new planning use class for short-term lets without delay. Nothing less than a full array of planning and non-planning tools is needed to appropriately regulate the number of short-term holiday lets. If this Government will not get on with it, they should step aside and leave it to a Government that will.

[Sir Charles Walker (in the Chair)]

Minister Rowley, could you leave a minute at the end for Steve Double to wind up, please?

Public Health

Debate between Justin Madders and Charles Walker

Monday 15th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Justin Madders]

I will come on to the discourteous way in which the Prime Minister has been announcing these things to press conferences instead of this Chamber.

It is important that this Chamber has a role because these are not minor or consequential changes that can be nodded through without debate. They affect millions of people’s lives, and we know that if we get it wrong, the consequences will be devastating. Debating them weeks after the event, and in some cases when they have been superseded by the next set of regulations, demeans parliamentary democracy. Changes such as these should always be accompanied by a statement to Parliament, not just showcased at Downing Street press conferences. We are not merely a rubber-stamping exercise to create the veneer of a democratic process. We should not be debating these measures late, and we should not be debating them without seeing the full extent of the information on which the Government based their decisions. We know that the next review of the regulations must take place on or before 25 June. If that review leads to further relaxations, will the Minister commit today that any regulations introduced off the back of that will be debated here before they are implemented and not retrospectively?

The reviews, which are legally required to happen under the regulations, took place on 16 April, 7 May and 28 May. I ask the Minister: where are they? In a written question, I asked the Secretary of State whether he would publish those reviews. I received a reply last week stating that the Department of Health and Social Care had indicated that it would not be possible to answer the question within the usual time period. Why on earth not? If the Government have conducted these reviews, why are they not in a position to disclose them? I find this absolutely incredible. Here we have the most far-reaching impositions into everyday life in this country, yet we have no idea what the Government’s own reviews of them say. These are reviews that are required under legislation.

[Sir Charles Walker]

They are far-reaching, and it is a pretty poor reflection on this Chamber that it is empty. It is probably only a third full, even with the social distancing rules in place. Where are our colleagues getting upset about the removal of people’s civil liberties? Neither side here has a great story to tell.

[Justin Madders]

If these regulations were actually going to be changed as a result of what we said here, we might see a better attendance, but the Government have shown the contempt in which they hold this place by introducing them way after the event. The question is: where are the reviews? What is it that we cannot see in them? This betrays a cavalier attitude to transparency, and it does absolutely nothing to engender confidence that the decisions that are being taken are the right ones.

Housing and Planning

Debate between Justin Madders and Charles Walker

Tuesday 3rd March 2020 Westminster Hall

[Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Charles. I will talk about Mostyn House in Parkgate, which was originally a boarding school and is now a listed building. Once the school closed, the site was certainly attractive to developers.

Revised plans to build apartments into the fabric of the old school were submitted halfway through its redevelopment. Despite the many efforts of under-resourced local authority enforcement officers, the developer, PJ Livesey, continually drags its feet, with the result that there is a list of outstanding works as long as your arm. Planning permission was only finally achieved some five years after residents first moved in. Developers have similarly patchy records elsewhere in the country, but because the system lacks the capacity to challenge these people, they continue to get away with it.

I have long spoken about the industrial scale mis-selling that arose as part of the leasehold scandal, and we finally saw official recognition of that last week from the Competition and Markets Authority. The situation at Mostyn House is slightly different but has many similarities. Little specific legal information was provided at the initial stage, particularly regarding planning and the leasehold position, and little documentation was produced in respect of service charges. What was provided was misleading and inaccurate on ongoing costs. There were also financial incentives to use panel solicitors and pressure to exchange contracts within a tight timescale.

Many people buying these apartments were experienced professionals whose concerns about those issues were assuaged at the time by the developer’s sales staff, who confidently stated that the purchase was covered by a Premier Guarantee warranty, which gave the buyers a 10-year guarantee similar to the National House Building Council’s. That sounds good, does it not—a Premier Guarantee warranty? It sounds pretty solid, and something to give certainty. Being compared to the NHBC’s guarantee gives it an air of respectability.

However, buyers might find that they have more rights if something goes wrong with their kettle. It is at best a dispute resolution service, not a guarantee, and is seriously compromised by virtue of being funded by the developers against whom it is meant to enforce the guarantee. Premier not only provides the warranty on the build of Mostyn House but also acts as the approved inspector in respect of building regulations. Premier is effectively employed as the building control and building regulation compliance body to inspect, approve and guarantee works undertaken by the developer that it is supposed to be insuring against.

After four years of back and forth, Premier’s surveyor recently viewed the development and agreed with the defects raised by residents. However, Premier is not prepared to progress the claims, even though water is pouring into apartments right now from the defective roofs, gutters and walls. Premier said:

“The remit of our service is to attempt to bring the two parties together, investigate the dispute and make recommendations…That being said, the conciliation service will not be suitable for all disputes.”

That is not a guarantee or warranty; it is a cop-out.

It is clear that some works by the developer were non-compliant, as additional fire separation works and modifications have had to be undertaken since occupation took place. How did Premier sign off those works in the first place? It is plainly evident that there has been a general lack of supervision of the development during its construction and a lack of inspections by the approved inspector. If it finds too many faults, it will have to pay out under its own insurance policy, funded by the developer. It is therefore easy to see how the temptation to be less than thorough could arise.

My constituents have been let down. The ombudsman has proven toothless and the Solicitors Regulation Authority ineffective. Indeed, anyone who cares to look at Trustpilot ratings for the ombudsman, the SRA and Premier will see that there is very little customer satisfaction anywhere in the country. There is a wholesale failure of regulation across the board on many issues, including in this case and others we have heard about. It is time that the Minister and the Government listened and sorted out this shambles once and for all.

[Sir Charles Walker (in the Chair)]

We will have to drop the time limit on speeches to three minutes.

Proxy Voting

Debate between Justin Madders and Charles Walker

Thursday 13th September 2018 Commons Chamber

[Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

Since I was elected just over three years ago, several debates and Committee inquiries have rightly condemned unacceptable employment practices, and I have always thought this place at its best when we come together and defend the rights of our constituents to be treated with dignity and fairness, but our right to hold others to account can be compromised if we allow arcane and meaningless tradition to lead to such disgraceful scenes as those we saw recently when desperately ill colleagues were forced to leave their hospital beds to go through the voting Lobbies. We rightly condemn the exploitation of workers, but, with such scenes, we risk the response, “Who are you to judge?”

This Parliament has a long history of things that make us proud, but rather than learning from that history, we seem at times to be bound by it. In what other workplace would a woman be asked to discharge herself from hospital for something that could be dealt with over the phone? Imagine how we would respond if another employer said that the reason they were insisting she do it was that it had always been done that way. I welcome the concept of proxy voting for Members who have had a baby or adopted a child as a first sensible step, and I would urge, as others have done today, that we get on with it as soon as possible.

We have heard differing views on this, but I believe we should be going much further. The Procedure Committee’s proposals do not cover the disgraceful scenes I just referred to, and although it should be the expectation that we be present in this place for debates and votes, there are many perfectly acceptable reasons why it might not always be possible. These could include personal or medical issues, as well as being away on official business as part of our role—to be clear, I am referring only to such absences as arise from a person’s role as an MP, not other jobs, such as being on the Front Bench, or other private interests.

The current situation creates several very serious issues. In matters of vital importance, it effectively forces people to put their health at risk if they want the voice of their constituency to heard. Again, if that was any other workplace, we would not allow it. Not only is the current system potentially unsafe; it allows people to be conveniently absent if they want to dodge an issue, the recent vote on Heathrow being a particularly memorable example. I would advocate proxy voting not just for those who are absent on health grounds or who have taken maternity or paternity leave, but to remove a convenient excuse from those who do not have the guts to represent what their constituents want. I understand what the Chair of the Procedure Committee said about personal information being disclosed in creating the dispensations for medical-related absences, but I am sure we can do it while respecting confidentiality.

It has been 18 months now since we last discussed the report “The Good Parliament”, which set out an extremely modest set of proposals to improve how this place works, yet it is very difficult to see what progress has been made in implementing any of them. So much needs to change here, including certain ridiculous practices, such as filibustering, the absence of maternity, paternity, adoption and caring leave, and complex webs of procedure and protocols that can be impossible to explain and justify to our constituents. For example, the Order Paper lists 60-odd private Members’ Bills due to be debated next month. If people expect these Bills to become law, we have to explain that they are not going to but are still on the Order Paper. Let us ensure that this debate is part of the wider debate about reforming the way this Parliament works.

In how many workplaces does the finish time vary and change at very short notice? That is in no way family-friendly. In which workplace is it acceptable for colleagues to stop speaking to another colleague because they disapprove of something they may or may not have said or done? In which job would it be considered normal to engage with colleagues on social media—and, yes, I do mean people from the same party—with sometimes those comments not being acceptable in any workplace and not passing any dignity at work policy? We should be setting an example in here about how we treat each other with respect and dignity. Of course there is rough and tumble in politics, but some of the behaviour we see in this Chamber would be unacceptable in any workplace, let alone any school.

Where is it considered acceptable to shout at someone who is addressing a room? Too often we see this Chamber descending into a bear pit. Of course those involved are trying to put off the Member speaking, but often, I have noticed, there is a sexist undertone to that, and it only usually puts off people watching outside; it does not work on those in here speaking.

There is so much we can do about the culture here, but we can also change the rules governing this place, and if we can change the rules, we can hopefully improve the culture as well. Having an uncodified constitution should be an advantage for us in doing that; we should be flexible and moving with the times, but we seem to be bound by decisions and protocols that are hundreds of years old, dating from before women were even able to vote.

On proxy voting, as we have heard, there are examples of it working in other parts of the world. In Australia proxy voting has been in place since 2008, and in evidence provided to the Procedure Committee the Clerk of the House of Australia said he was not aware of any negative feedback about its use. New Zealand has two different systems for proxy voting, and proxy voting could even be found in the past in this place: until 1868—a bit before my time—Lords who were not present could vote by proxy, while in the Commons proxies were allowed in the medieval Parliament. We are not just stuck in the past; we are almost going backwards on some of these issues.

I believe that we can move to a system of proxy voting, and, as touched on already, we ought to be looking at having a full electronic voting system, which is common in many Chambers. The US House of Representatives has been doing that since the 1970s, and they may vote at any number of stations located throughout the Chamber. As we have heard, in the United Kingdom the Scottish Parliament and National Assembly for Wales both use electronic voting systems.

[Mr Charles Walker]

I hear what the hon. Gentleman says about electronic voting, and he is citing the House of Representatives in America. I think he should look at the quality of debate in many of those Chambers before extolling the virtues of electronic voting too vociferously.

[Justin Madders]

I think there are many factors that influence the quality of debate in America, not least the party system and the way it is funded. To put that all down to electronic voting might be a slight oversimplification.

As we have heard, going through the voting Lobby gives us a chance to talk to Ministers about important constituency issues, but, as has also been said, only very rarely are Back-Bench Members, certainly on this side of the Chamber, in the same Lobby as Ministers, and I think chance meetings like that are not the best way to be doing important business on behalf of our constituents.

In conclusion, I think the proposals of the Procedure Committee are—pardon the pun—a baby-step towards a modern Parliament; they clearly fall some way short of the workplace protections our constituents have and a long way short of where I think we should be as a modern forward-thinking democracy. But at least we are discussing this, even if it is a century after the first woman was elected to this place.

However much I disagree with the process of English votes for English laws, that has shown that we can change our procedures quickly when there is a desire from the Government. So let us hope that we do not have to wait another century for further progress and we see the same commitment from the Government on this issue that we saw from them on introducing English votes for English laws, and that the recommendations in the “Good Parliament” report are used as part of a wider debate about how we conduct ourselves so we, and our constituents, have confidence that Parliament operates in a transparent, modern and effective manner.

Procedure committee

Debate between Justin Madders and Charles Walker

Monday 18th April 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Walker]

The hon. Lady makes a very good point. Debate in this place should never be a sport; it should be about contesting the issues, arguments and propositions before the House. I agree with her sentiments, and I hope that we are beginning to travel in the right direction.

[Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

I congratulate the Procedure Committee on its report and wish it more success than previous attempts at achieving reform. We have a tired, discredited system that really does us no credit at all. Much of this short debate has focused on the benefits of Fridays, and I note that the report does not talk about the sitting hours of the House. May I urge the Committee to look at that question as a matter of urgency, because I believe that some of the answers might lie in having different sitting times for private Members’ Bills?

[Mr Walker]

The Procedure Committee has deliberately steered away from looking at the sitting times of the House, but during the last Parliament, we pledged to conduct a survey of Members’ views on sitting hours at the end of the first year of every new Parliament and to bring forward a neutral motion that Members could then amend. I hope that will provide the hon. Gentleman with some comfort. He will get an opportunity at some stage in the near future to look at the sitting hours of the House, at which point I imagine that everything will be up for debate.